A Few Good Links (vol 8).

Time for a few more good links. Because I'm too busy right now to post much else.

1.  Mike Flynn continues his discussion of the Galileo Affair.
2. On a related front, two interesting articles from Space.com. For those who haven't heard, Voyager 1 has "officially" left the solar system: it's the first man-made object to have done this. Also, (and this is older), a cool article about how to build a faster-than-light drive, which operates by moving space around the object at speeds exceeding c. A similar concept is used by the above-linked Mr Flynn in his excellent Spiral Arm series.
3. Two posts from the same person, one on IGNITUM TODAY and one on Nicene Guys. These came out around the same time, and makes the first comment on the IGNITUM TODAY site all the more ironic (and, to be blunt, ignorant) in its attempt at trolling.
4. Related to the Nicene Guys article, Jimmy Akin has his own assessment of the Pope's open letter, concluding that the Evangelical blogosphere was wrong in their assessment of the pope's remarks. I agree with him on this one, but I really don't blame them (at least, not all of them). Sure, there are some anti-Catholics in the group, but a number are just reacting to what the media reported (if it can be called reporting), and so the incident serves as yet another reminder that the media really is not competent (or else is being malicious) to report on matters of theology.
5. The ending to the Arizona State Wisconsin game on Saturday is one of the most bizarre I've ever seen:
   
   

And neither of the teasm that I generally root for have figured out how to play defense this year, which is strange given that last year one of them had a generally solid defense while the other's bad defense last year looked like a historical aberration. The former is now 2-1, and the latter 1-2, with all of the losses being bad in their own way.

6. On a related note to SEC teams, when you chant SEC! SEC! SEC!, it's best to do so when your conference is winning a big game (like a national championship), not when a ranked team is beating a rank team, and especially not when your conference is 1-2 in marquee matchups on the year (with that one coming against what now looks like an overrated TCU team). UT may yet rebound (and Ole Miss may yet tank), but beating what looks like a bad team playing without its starting quarterback and one of its top offensive playmakers the week after it fires its offensive coordinator is really not all that impressive.
7. Slate is not good for much more than the occasional laugh. Here they've collected a list of odd first names used by Puritans.
8. And, to close with some very good news, abortion clinics are closing around the country. It kind of puts the lie to that argument about how pro-life laws don't prevent abortions.

I may return to some of these later.